The late withdrawal of Phillips Idowu, Great Britain’s top triple jumper, from this evening’s Golden League meeting here has infuriated organisers, who fear he may have decided to compete at Sunday’s Grand Prix meeting in Sheffield instead.
Idowu won the opening Golden League event in Oslo before pulling out in Paris last week with a back injury, ending any hope he had of claiming part of the $1 million (about £500,000) jackpot for winning at all six Golden League meetings. Luigi D’Onofrio, the director of tonight’s Golden Gala at the Olympic Stadium, says he was assured that Idowu would compete, only for him to withdraw 48 hours before the meeting.
“I don’t know what is wrong with him, I was only told he is injured,” D’Onofrio said. “I was then told he would be coming to Rome, but now he isn’t. I am sure that if he competes in Sheffield it will be a miracle. I am angry about it because we had lots of competitors who wanted to compete here but we had to tell them no.”
The withdrawal of Nathan Douglas through injury from the same event leaves Michael Rimmer, in the 800 metres, as the sole British representative, a legacy of Sunday’s event in Sheffield and something D’Onofrio thinks must be addressed. “I will make a protest to the IAAF because we are trying to get all the best athletes in the world to these meetings and then we have a calendar with such a clash,” he said.
The event will feature the first race between Asafa Powell, the joint world record-holder, and Derrick Atkins, one of this season’s most exciting breakthrough talents, in the 100 metres. Atkins, 23, from the Bahamas, recorded a personal best of 9.95sec in Athens this month and Powell, 24, believes the emergence of new sprint talent will spur him on to greater success. “If someone breaks the world record [9.77sec], I will just have to go and break it again,” the Jamaican said.